Ever since Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley announced last year that LIV Golf members who were qualified for the Masters would be welcome to compete, despite having been banned indefinitely by the PGA Tour for their defections, the question of their acceptance at the annual rite of spring has hung like a cloud over professional golf.
Can the game put aside its differences, increasingly more vitriolic via LIV Golf’s federal antitrust lawsuit against the PGA Tour and a resulting war of words among many players on both sides, this week at bucolic Augusta National?
Don’t bet on it. There will be a de facto tournament within a tournament at the 87th Masters, with one question to be answered at the top of Augusta National’s famous hand-operated scoreboards: Will LIV Golf’s best players beat the PGA Tour head-to-head?
With 18 LIV golfers – notably past Masters champions Sergio García, Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson, Patrick Reed, Charl Schwartzel and Bubba Watson – making up nearly one-fifth of the field, the chances are pretty good a LIV man could be wearing green at the end of the weekend.
Cameron Smith, the reigning Open champion, sought to rebut the notion that LIV Golf, ridiculed by detractors for its 54-hole formats, shotgun starts, team format and party atmosphere, is more than mere exhibition golf.
“There’s a lot of chatter going around about, ‘These guys don’t play real golf anymore,’ ” Smith, who finished T-3 at the 2022 Masters, said last week at LIV’s event in Winter Garden, Florida. “I think it’s B.S., to be honest, and we just want to show people that. I think it is important for us (LIV players) to go there, really show a high standard of golf which we know we’re all capable of.”
Chile’s Joaquín Niemann, in an interview with Golf Magazine’s Josh Sens, put it more bluntly: “I think it’s going to be more fun knowing that they hate us. Then go to the majors and beat them.”
Nick Faldo, a three-time Masters winner who will break bread with past champions from the rival tours at the annual Champions Dinner on Tuesday night at Augusta National, offered a few words of advice for the LIV players: “I’ve got nothing against these guys; the grass is greener on the other side and all that,” he said in an interview with Jim White of London’s Telegraph newspaper. “But don’t get all uppity if people object when you come back.”
Meanwhile, LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman offered an image of how a victory by a LIV competitor might be celebrated at Augusta National.
“If one of the guys, no matter who it is, they are all going to be there on the 18th green,” Norman told NCA Newswire in his native Australia. “They are all going to be there, and that just gives me goosebumps to think about.”
A tradition unlike any other, indeed.
David Stacy, Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
In other Augusta National news:
Aaron Wise withdrew from the Masters, citing a need to focus on his mental health. “This hurts, but it’s needed,” he said via social media. Wise, 26, a one-time winner on the PGA Tour and the 2018 rookie of the year, had missed cuts in four of his past five starts in stroke-play events and stood No. 45 in the Official World Golf Ranking. With the WD, the Masters field was reduced to 88 players entering the Valero Texas Open, which offered the final exemption. READ MORE
Gary Player, a three-time Masters champion, isn’t feeling appreciated by Augusta National these days. Player, 87, who won the 1961, 1974 and 1978 Masters titles and serves as an honorary starter each year, told Tom Kershaw for London’s Sunday Times that he has to “beg” for a round at the club. “After all I’ve contributed to the tournament and been an ambassador for them, I can’t go and have a practice round there with my three grandchildren without having to beg a member to play with us, and there’s always some excuse,” he said. “It’s terribly, terribly sad. … If it wasn’t for the players, (Augusta National) would just be another golf course in Georgia.” READ MORE
Tom Watson confirmed he has recovered well enough from recent shoulder surgery to join Jack Nicklaus and Player as honorary starters before Thursday’s first round of the Masters, the two-time Masters champion told Golfweek’s Adam Schupak. Watson, 73, was involved in a go-kart accident last fall on his Kansas farm and underwent replacement surgery on his left shoulder. READ MORE
Masters fans will see two of the most visible improvements to the iconic club at this week’s tournament – the new tee at the par-5 13th hole and a redesigned par-3 course – but constant improvement is merely part of the club’s long-term vision, according to a report by Golf Digest’s Joel Beall. That future blueprint could feature another golf course, onsite housing for participants and more. READ MORE
Tiger Woods didn’t compete on the PGA Tour last week, as is customary for the five-time Masters champion en route to Augusta National, but he and his TGR Design firm nonetheless had a winning week.
The PGA Tour announced the World Wide Technology Championship will move in the fall to the Woods-designed El Cardonal Course at Diamante Cabo San Lucas on the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California Peninsula. Tournament dates will be announced when the tour releases its fall schedule. The WWT had been played since its 2007 debut at Mayakoba Resort’s El Camaleón Golf Club, a Greg Norman-designed course in Playa del Carmen on Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. The PGA Tour needed a new home when rival LIV Golf, with Norman as its CEO, announced it would play its 2023 season-opening tournament at Mayakoba in February. READ MORE
Woods and baseball’s Mike Trout will team to build a private club in New Jersey. Trout, a 10-time all-star centerfielder with the Los Angeles Angels, has commissioned Woods’ TGR Design to create Trout National – The Reserve on a former silica sand mine in Vineland, New Jersey, near Trout’s hometown of Millville. Construction, which will feature an 18-hole course, a short course, practice range and short-game area, is scheduled to begin this year, with a projected 2025 opening. READ MORE
Woods will design a short course and, through his TGR Foundation, provide educational programming to Cobbs Creek Golf Course, a Philadelphia muni that was home to the late Charlie Sifford. READ MORE
TAP-INS
The PGA Tour announced its eligibility requirements for 2024 when the tour returns to a calendar-year schedule, establishing key cutoffs for the top 50, 70 and 125 players in the FedEx Cup standings. Among the changes will be many more FedEx Cup points awarded in the “designated events” than the regular full-field tournaments. READ MORE
Less than one year after launching, LIV Golf is talking about expanding for a second time, Alex Miceli reported for Sports Illustrated, citing conversations with players and others associated with the Saudi-funded rival tour. LIV, which played eight tournaments in its inaugural season, expanded to 14 events this year with an emphasis on the team format as the tour attempts to sell franchises in a model similar to those of other professional sports. READ MORE
LPGA players were informed about the tour’s continuing merger talks with the Ladies European Tour during a mandatory players’ meeting at the recent LPGA Drive On Championship in Gold Canyon, Arizona, Golf Digest’s Kent Paisley reported, citing sources. LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan spoke with players about TV viewership goals, purse growth and how a merger might affect women’s golf, without disclosing specifics of a union between the top women’s tours in the U.S. and Europe. The LPGA and LET entered a joint venture in 2019. READ MORE
Less than a week after canceling its tournament in Taiwan, the LPGA filled the hole on its schedule for the fall Asia Swing. The inaugural Maybank Championship will be played Oct. 26-29 at Kuala Lumpur Country Club in Malaysia’s capital. The 78-player field will compete for $3 million in the no-cut event, which will be the third of four stops in Asia. READ MORE
The Hong Kong Open will be played for the first time since 2020 when the tournament returns to the Asian Tour schedule this fall, organizers announced. The event, which dates to 1959, had been canceled in three of the past four years: in 2019 because of protests in the disputed island territory and in 2021 and 2022 because of the pandemic. The $2 million event will be played November 9-12 at Hong Kong Golf Club in Fanling. READ MORE
More than 4 out of 5 respondents to a TaylorMade survey are opposed to the golf ball rollback proposed by the USGA and R&A and dislike the idea of different rules for professionals and amateurs, the equipment manufacturer said. In response to the question, “Do you agree with the proposed golf ball rule?”, 81 percent of the 44,517 respondents answered “no” and the same percentage oppose bifurcation in the rules. Also, 77 percent did not agree average hitting distances need to be reduced. The vast majority of the respondents – 79 percent – described themselves as recreational golfers. TaylorMade, which invited golfers to participate via the company’s website and social-media channels, plans to provide feedback from the 14-question survey to the USGA and R&A. The governing bodies have invited comments until Aug. 14. READ MORE
Compiled by Steve Harmon